The Aggregate of strikers was much greater on the last day of the strike than on the first and the fighting spirit was much tougher. Nor did the strike fail because of a fall in the morale of the workers. The University students and other middle class scabs could not replace the transport workers and certainly did not intend to replace the miners. The breakdown was greater than that caused by the air raids on London in 1940-41 and took much longer to repair. About one per cent, of normal train services were running, but only nine days of that caused chaos on the railways for months afterwards. The attempt of the middle-class to scab on the strikers was a poor effort and was rapidly breaking down the machines used. The number of blacklegs was insignificant. Why did the British General Strike of 1926 fail? Not because the workers failed to strike. During the 1926 General Strike the strikers did not care two hoots whether the strike was legal or illegal. On the other hand, when the workers are willing to engage the class enemy in a General Strike they will not consult Acts of Parliament to do so. The Labour leaders believe that, for the present at least, they can better suppress strikes by their control of the trade unions than by Parliament. The repeal of The 1927 Trades Disputes Act by the Labour Parliament makes little difference to the prospect of a General Strike. They will win and we will stand beside them every step of the way.The Social General Strike by Tom Brown 1927 But our Brazilian sisters and brothers show a bottomless reserve of determination to stand up to this ruthless behavior. It wants to impoverish the working class through stripping away hard fought gains and silencing the unions by cutting back on bargaining rights and choking off union resources. UNI Global Union General Secretary, Christy Hoffman said, “The Brazilian government does not hide its intentions. “We are demonstrating against the Pension Reform, and also for the release of Lula, and for a true democracy where the interest of corrupt politicians are not above the interest of the people,” he concluded. Marcio Monzane, Regional Secretary of UNI Americas said: “We are in Brazil to express our support for our affiliates, and because we are not going to give up on our hard fought achievements and rights.” The Brazilian people are taking to the streets to show their anger : we have already seen it in the massive mobilisations against the Labor and Education Reforms, and recently against the proposed Pension Reform. Bolsonaro is adopting policies which explicitly target unions in order to reduce their influence in society. The new law which prohibits the payroll deduction of union fees, the reductions in salaries, attacks on job security and pensions are also creating a new kind of poverty. The current policies of the Brazilian government are actively worsening conditions for workers and intentionally attacking unions, with high levels of unemployment that increase every month, and an economy that has touched bottom. The general strike scheduled for June 14 across Brazil has a clear message for the government of Jair Bolsonaro: economic growth cannot be at the expense of cutting back on the rights of workers and pensioners.
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